


Vow with a Bow

by Eyrdamun



Category: Persona 5
Genre: AU, Drabble Collection, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-10
Updated: 2018-04-22
Packaged: 2019-01-31 12:39:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 7,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12682065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eyrdamun/pseuds/Eyrdamun
Summary: The world is give and take, take and give. Akira Kurusu chooses to take power and give his soul away.





	1. Kinship

**Author's Note:**

> AU where Akira is a witch, Akechi not really human and Haru has a vendetta. The drabbles are posted in non-chronological order.
> 
> I posted some of these on twitter already lmao but figured it was about time I put them here too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Arsene/Akira

“It seems, young child, that you have something that belongs to me.”

Arsène is aware of how weak humans are. A scary face makes them cry, sharp teeth make them tremble, and claws force them to crumble at his feet. He never has to use his chains nor his flames to make them bend to his will. This was a constant even with the loss- no, the undoing- of his true self.

“This isn’t the offering.”

Yet the kid meets the flame pattern of his obsidian mask with daring, sharp grey eyes and an expressionless visage. He doesn’t even attempt to clutch the flasked fragment, doesn’t even budge from his sit on the floor, not when Arsène pointed a black clawed hand towards it as he crawled from the gaps in the wooden floor like miasma.

He’s a funny one, Arsène decides. An interesting one.

A human child that got hold of a fragment of his past self.

“And what can I offer for it?” The demon thief’s tone is mocking. The boy picks up on it.

“I don’t know, how about you tell me.”

Arsène’s laughter is a the harsh cawing of a murder of crows. The kid flinches then, the cracks in his facade finally showing. He recovers quickly enough, Arsène would admit as much.

“Negotiating with a demon?” he coos as the smoke materializing his body surges upwards- he holds his hat as he cranes his head forward and his back presses against the rickety ceiling. 

Arsène looks around and the kid still stares at the red flames on his mask. The room he has been summoned in is in bad shape. There's a bed in the corner and the demon thief hums as he acknowledges the bedroom he was summoned in.

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” the kid manages to choke out.

The black smoke wraps around the floorboards one last time before dissipating and leaving behind rot in its wake. The kid doesn’t notice- too focused on the demon looming above him to note the maggot crawling near his feet on blackened wood.

Basking in the human's attention, Arsène surges forward and cages the boy under his form. Both claws on either side of the body as his black wings wrap around them. His white cravat caresses the kid’s face as he tries his best to meet the demon’s face by looking up at an uncomfortable angle.

It gets buried under it though, a white veil weighted down by Arsène’s own golden chains around the human's skull.

“I wonder, young child, which one of us is the beggar?”

The kid reaches up, his hand blindly grasping at the red string holding the demon's vest, and loops his fingers about the ends.

“Who knows?” The head under his cravat shifts downwards, the child giving up his attempt to meet the demon eye to eye. “It could be the both of us.”

He doesn’t flinch this time when the howling caws fill his ears and echo in the room. Instead, Arsène feels the mood change and he is certain the child is smiling with him. The demon's heels scratch the floor with a screech as he accommodates himself over the human that held one of his missing pieces.

"Then allow me to ask, what will this poor fool sacrifice for a demon's time?"

Blood is the first thing he offers.

A cut on his thumb where one can feel his heartbeat, small and swift, yet still so red that when the kid presses his lips against it they are painted.

A kiss, indirect and soft, is the second thing he offers.

He reaches up from under the veil of white fabric and presses his thumb against Arsène’s mask. Jagged edges of flames emulating teeth nip at the bleeding heartbeat and the demon drinks.

Rebellion is the third offering.

The boy speaks of goals too grand for someone so cursed. The demon doesn't know the meaning of being thrown away but understands the tinge of betrayal colouring his words. Something akin to kinship flares in the demon and he leans his masked face closer to the boy’s. He’s a breath away, looming still over the kid sitting between his knees and covered by the curtains of his feathers.

Power is what Arsène first offers the child.

The curse flowing in the boy’s veins is weaponized and sharpened. It becomes a bird, a snake, a predator at the kid’s beckon call.

A chain, cold and far reaching, is what the demon thief offers second.

It slithers up the boy’s left leg from Arsène’s claws and wraps about his throat- it squeezes with a promise and vanishes from sight. Its weight lingers still on the flesh.

“A leash?”

“A leash.” The child frowns momentarily but then shrugs.

Hell is the third offering.

Or rather, the knowledge of it, the knowledge of what lies under the flesh eating away at the boy’s future and heart. Knowledge is power, ignorance is bliss and freedom is borne from neither. The kid laughs and unlike the call of death that is Arsène’s own, his is the tolling bells and the melody of a bass.

Lastly, they give each other a fourth offering.

Whispering at the same time under the cover of a dark night and under the veil of feathers blacker still, they gift one another their names.


	2. Pas de Trois, Pas à Toi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Akechi/Akira, Arsene/Akira

The cup Akira had brewed for Akechi had long gone cold. He offers the other boy- half demon, Arsène whispers against the shell of his ear- another cup. It's an excuse to stay longer at the cafe and Akira wonders if Akechi is aware of it when he declines.

If he is, he still remains in his sit as if he doesn't need a reason to stay for once.

Or maybe he is adamant about using the cold coffee as an excuse.

Akira shrugs, Arsène hums against his dark curls. He's there, yet he's not. Akira isn't sure if he'll ever be used to it but he knows he'll miss it if it were to stop. He doesn't think much of it as he walks around the counter and flops on the chair besides Akechi.

Featherman is on, some rerun episode Futaba made him watch with her last week. Maybe it's due to its lack of novelty that Akechi isn't enraptured by the show as he tends to be. Maybe it's also due to not being used to having Akira so close without a counter between them.

He swallows air. He doesn't think he is that special, Akechi has sat near a lot of people already. Arsène's caws as the phantom of a dark claw traces Akira's spine.

He shivers, flushes a bit, and can't meet Akechi's eyes.

Arsène is unforgiving while he talks into the crook of the human's neck, " Is it envy?"

Akira's heartbeat picks up its pace. Pumps faster all the while the tip of a sharp claw draws circles in the small of his back. He steals a glance to Akechi who pretends not to pay him any mind, but Akira can see his finger drumming against the rim of the mug.

"What's on your mind?"

A crow caws outside, or maybe it's Arsène and inside his head. "What's this?"

Akechi merely shakes his head and takes a sip from the cold coffee. He licks his lips as he frowns in confusion.

"I did offer you another cup for a reason."

Akechi smiles tightly. He opens his mouth, voice already half way out of his throat before Akira tenses, cheeks a pretty pink, and turns away.

"For a reason, you say." Arsène's cravat brushes the nape of his neck and the hand is still on his back. Akira tries not to squirm as Arsène's voice overshadows whatever Akechi started to say, "A petty thief who can't even admit what he desires has no business stealing something as valuable as time."

Akira knows that's true and his teeth worry his lower lip for a bit.

Suddenly, all too suddenly, Akechi is close. "Are you alright, Kurusu-kun?"

Akira realizes then that he had leaned forward and Akechi moved to meet him half way. He doesn't know when it happened, or when he started slouching under Arsène's touch, but not even the knowledge of their current position is enough to ground him again in the moment. On the other hand, the cool black leather circling his wrist does.

He wonders how he got there, in an alley coffee shop whose kitchen smell of both his successes and failures. A demon whispering into the shell of his ear about things he wants buried six feet under as another demon- a demon that is troublesome, troubling and alluring- makes a show of pretend worrying over him.

The flash of a scream in the night, of "No, let me go" and the sound of a man thudding against the floor, rushes in the back of his mind and Akira knows exactly how he got here.

"Petty, " Arsène murmurs in a low baritone as his weight pushes Akira forward just slightly. "Thief."

Akechi leans in as well. "Kurusu-kun."

"Just for tonight, the next cup is on the house."

Akechi chuckles, an expression too happy and guiltily fulfilled. The chain around his neck decides on that moment to snake slightly against the nape of his neck, reminding Akira of its presence.

"I'll make sure to keep it a secret from the boss then," Akechi whispers against his lips and, oh, they were that close?

The chain coils around his throat. "A thief who can't even admit what he wants doesn't deserve his desires even imagined."

Akira kisses Akechi, a feather light touch of lips as the chain hisses and chokes him. Arsène's claw scratches along the side of his ribs. It doesn't matter to him, not in the moment, not as Akechi kisses him firmly and his leather gloves hold Akira's face in place.

The chains rattle, and Akechi's left hand drops from his cheek to his neck. The metal around it loosens and breathing becomes easier- or as easy as Akechi allows it with his lips massaging his.

Akira doesn't question why.

He feels a nick on his bottom lip. It was already tender from his teeth biting into it and Akechi's teeth are sharper than any human's. The half demon pulls away, an apology already dancing on his razor sharp tongue.

Akira shakes his head and grabs Akechi's tie to pull him in again. Arsène sighs against his dark curls, "How deceitful."

Akechi growls and his arms wrap around Akira as Akira bites his top lip. When he lets go, the Featherman credit roll played on the television and Akechi's cell phone is ringing.

The half demon pulls away, and Arsène pulls him closer.

"I have to take this."

"Sure, I'll make sure you come back to a hot cup this time. I'll even pour it in the same mug."

Akechi smiles but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. "I might not come back at all."

"Then I'll drink it for you."

His expression is unreadable, so is Akira's stare. The difference, however, is that Akira's eyes are veiled by black feathers and Akechi turns around with his phone in hand.


	3. Parfum

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haru/Akira. I wanted to have one drabble for each of the pairings up today, I'll see when I'll post the others shrugs.

Akira keeps wiping the counter. Morgana creeps on the stairs as he stares at the intruder.

She is small, her hair fluffy.

She reeks of rosemary.

Akira puts on his usual customer service smile, a gentle upward turn of the lips that is as cutting as Arsène's heels, and opens his mouth to ask-

"I know you're a witch."

The huntress is straight to the point, but so is Akira. He motions the stool in front of him while leisurely burying his hand in his pocket and clutching the pocketknife there. Morgana stares more intently from the shadows, fur standing on its edge and teeth and claws ready to be bared.

She daintily sits in front of him, taking out a photograph from her pink sweater.

The fragrance of rosemary permeates around him and Morgana flinches from his spot on the step. Akira takes the picture into his own hands and stares at the man in it.

"Witch, his name is Okumura," the huntress speaks softly as she folds her hands on the counter. "I've come to request your help."

"Is a hunter really asking coalition from a witch?"

"You will be rewarded."

Akira hums, analyzing the Okumura's features on the glossy paper.

"Without your help, only more harm will come to defenseless people." Her eyes are resolute, Akira is already thinking of giving her tips so that the perfume she wears doesn't ward off his spirits and how to school her expression to make it less obvious when someone wronged her in the past. "I cannot let his foul deeds go on."

Morgana growls a warning.

Akira grins, the danger on his lips more obvious than before.

"What coffee would you like?" He points with a flourish to the menu overhead. "We're in for quite the long negotiation it seems."

The juxtaposition of the huntress' small tender smile and the blazing scorn in her eyes lit a spark in the witch's spine.

Morgana ran up the stairs in frustration, but Akira has decided that he's only just started having fun.

Arsène chuckles in the back of his mind and reminds him with a poison sweet voice of vows, bows, and dances.


	4. Soaking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sexual content. Arsène/Akira.
> 
> Guess what was written during Halloween?  
> By tmr I'll probably have all of these posted lmao

He expects the demon to be more furtive and out of reach. Arsène was, at first, only on the back of his mind and under his skin. But as the days went by, he visits more and more.

Sometimes during dawn, seldom during the afternoon, the demon manifests in what is an excuse of flesh for it in the cage of a dusty attic.

Mostly at night. Akira wonders what it means when he tries to welcome the thief into his bed without sparing a single thought, but it's the creature itself that motions to bed him.

"You think loudly for someone so quiet."

Akira feels the pull of the chain on his neck. He meets the painted flames on the mask staring at him but doesn't move from where he stands in the middle of the room. He's close from where the demon first emerged, the rotten wood only recently replaced after Sojiro had accused him of planting the maggots himself to get better flooring.

Arsène sits on his cot, legs crossed and claws gently tapping the mattress. He raises one, and Akira mirrors the motion with his own hand. The demon stops, the human's palm faces the heavens as his fingers curl towards him.

Come, Akira's thought booms between them.

Crows cheer too loudly as the feelings rises to his feet with grace and a mock bow. Sauntering, he tightens the leash about Akira's neck. A snake ties them together and Akira feels every bit as prey as any other time. At the beginning, he prayed that with a demon by his side the vulnerability would come to an end as damnation filled his human form. Instead, he finds it festering under Arsène's touch.

When the demon reaches him, he kneels and steals his breath away. It lasts only a second, maybe more, and the chains loosen their grasp on Akira. He finds himself slumped, face pressed in a veil of white and claws slithering up his sides.

"Vulnerability is beautiful, wouldn't you agree? " Arsène whispers into his ears, into his mind, as Akira struggles to catch his breath.

"You called beauty poison." Akira's voice is not threatening when he chokes out the words from a sore trachea.

Cawing in his ears, he's swooped into feathers and wrapped in demonic red clothed arms. The claws squeeze his flesh, and he feels them under his skin even if they hadn't pierced it.

In his bones, in his veins, in his tendons and his flesh, Arsène's touch reaches and echos too far in and he becomes a hecatoncheir, a mass of limbs that don't exist but whose phantom touch it still felt.

It's normal, it's weakness bared and festering under rot, but Akira feels his body react nonetheless to the murmurs of Arsène's motions. They magnify, their harmonies swimming in the human's ears and the temperature rises with the creeping ballet of a curse.

It's hard to swallow and he gasps for breath, Arsène dips him again.

His feet drag against the wooden floor momentarily as the demon tangos with his body- the claws hold him up like dead weight. The demon's curse is all around them like black miasma and the trail of their dance. Venom in the air, waiting to pour itself on whomever would dare interfere.

Next thing Akira notices is his knees on the bed and the clawing at the fabric of his chest. He wants to complain, opens his mouth but ends up licking his dry lips and swallows loudly.

Akira stays quiet, reaches for his shirt and lies back on creeping smoke.

It hardens into black tendrils, black maggots, Akira snorts. They lick up the lines of his muscles and bury themselves under the fabric of his sweat pants. A part of him, the tiny part that questions dealing with the Devil, the part that wants to observe and stay in the shadows as the world crumbles about him screams. It screams at how he becomes pliant, fertile earth, so that the roots can take hold and merge themselves into his veins.

He's receptive. Nurturing. Poison fills his pores. The demon looms over him, cages him between his arms and claws digging into the space besides his head.

Akira raises his head, meets the demon halfway, and turns it to the side. His cheek presses against the burning cool mask and a shudder races from the tip of his toes, up his spine and pushes out from his grinding teeth with a sigh.

The mask is ice, the curse is roots. Arsène and the vines are the swaying of water, black feathers are the water surface. Akira is going to drown. "Are you trying to look away?"

"No," Akira's whisper is lost as the demon presses against the culmination of Arsène's effects between his thighs.

"How frail is the mind of humans," he hums with a voice like a knife caressing against the shell of Akira's ears. "To hide its desires behind dishonest excuses."

Barking fills the room, Akira takes a second to realizes it's his own laughter.

"Dangerous," he whispers, eyes piercing like a bullet between the painted flaming eyes of the demon mask.

"Frail." The demon caws in amusement as the tendrils finally rid Akira of his remaining clothes and claws wrap around his thighs.

"Poisonous," the human corrects. "Isn't that what you said?"

He's hard, part of him still wants to deny that he willingly wants this every time. His inner turmoil is ignored and Arsène scratches from Akira's sternum down to his belly button. It feels like dissection, or maybe surgery, and the black smoke filters in. With no reply coming, he continues,

"Arsène, come kiss death."

One of the demon's hand wraps itself over Akira's eyes, and from between his fingers, Akira peeks. The other hand reaches for his mask, it starts pulling it aside, and the crack between the thief's claw closes. Blinded, he can only feel as the vines tie him down and squeeze and hold his legs spread wide to accommodate the demon between them.

Akira tilts his hips, Arsène meets him halfway. The human's lips fall open just in time for something liquid, but too solid and yet gaseous to slip past his lips, between his teeth and into his mouth. The sludge spreads as Arsène grinds faster, looms closer and the white handkerchief on his neck presses against Akira's chest. The yellow ornament chains hitting his pecs at the thrusting's pace.

The hand leaves his face, both wrap around his waist. The curse spread, coaxes and coos Akira open while the sludge spreads over his face. He can't open his eyes, it doesn't bother him though.

Relaxed, willing, he welcomes in too easily Arsène's girth.

The demon is a thief, he steals Akira's common sense and modesty the farther he pushes inside his body. Like cogs in motion, Akira spreads his leg wider and the vines aid him, he sighs and gasp around the foreign texture waltzing with his tongue.

"So compliant," Arsène coos in his ears. "So exquisite."

You haven't gotten laid with many people, Akira thinks.

There's a murder of crow going off in his head, and his body feels more like putty than whatever moves against his face. Arsène keeps thrusting, his tempo slow yet too much. The sludge keeps moving on his face and in his mouth. Caresses that feel like heaven and made just for him.

Between his leg, it's the sinful song of carnal pleasure. His head is in paradise, his body in inferno. His heart in the insanity of the juxtaposing sensation.

He can feel himself tearing up.

The sludge licks the tear that slip, or Arsène himself licks them. It's strange, it's bizarre. Maybe the sludge is Arsène's face. There's no division between the curse, the demon and Akira.

Blindly, Akira reaches and clutches the decorating golden chains. He pulls, the motion reverberating and tightening the chains on his own neck but he doesn't care. More, he thinks. Even if he could speak. Akira is louder in his head. More, Arsène gives him, his tempo increasing.

"This," Arsène states and Akira resonates, "is unity."

He can hear the creaking of the boxes he uses as a bed frame, the flapping of wings to give an extra push and the fabric fluttering. It's loud, but the cacophony under Akira's skin is louder.

"Greedy."

He can feel it, feel himself rising, feel himself drowning. For a second, the flash of a golden mask with red eyes and horns stares him down.

"Well, a human like you has to be."

The thief sits Akira on his lap as he keeps thrusting upwards. He reaches deeper still into Akira's core, but the human knows it's not due to the change in position. His low moaning should be lost between the sludge, the tendrils and all the noise, but it's loud, amplified by darkness and Arsène soaks it in.

Akira sighs, a bonding moment, a binding moment. Arsène agrees.

Synchronously, they soar together and spill as one, Arsène holding Akira through and through. Claws play with his curl, whatever was on his face melts and Akira opens his eyes to the masked demon's face.

"Rest." "Stay."

He slumps further onto the demon's chest. He's still inside him, he'll be sore, it doesn't matter. They don't need to voice their " I will".


	5. Embrasse-le

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haru/Akira, guest appearance of PT.

The attic is dusty and candlelit- the curtains are drawn, and no light can come in or out. 

The minerals used to draw the ritual circle glisten as the flames dance around it.

Akira sits on a wooden, oh so rickety and possibly splintery, chair in the center facing the stairs where Haru stands atop. He smiles like a knife to be plunged into her lungs, and Morgana lounges on his shoulders.

Haru barely notices the fox demon Yusuke and the apprentice witch Ann stare at her from their perch on the couch, she barely shoots a glance to the only other human in the room, Futaba as she sits on the messy bed in the corner with a laptop on her right whereas the two werewolves, Ryuji and Makoto if she recalls correctly, examine her from their spot near a lone plant. They are ready to bite the soft of her throat off the moment she steps out of line, she knows.

The thrill of danger, the promise of a fight, set her instincts ablaze and the reflexes cultivated by years of hunting demons flare for a fight. 

Haru takes a steadying breath.

She is not here for that, her armament is only an escort under the veil of the night.

The witch raises his hand towards her and beckons with a curl of his finger so graceful Haru can’t help but admire as she walks towards him. She stops merely a foot away from him and he crosses his legs, folding his hands on his lap. He's enchanting in his relaxed poise and Haru quietly smiles to herself at the choice of words.

“So tell me, good huntress,” his voice is silky and she can hear a devil’s laughter in it. “What is your name?”

“You already know, witch.”

Akira laughs, and from somewhere behind her she hears Ryuji growl a warning.

“Indulge me,” the twinkle in his eyes is the glint of coiling chains. “I have to drink your name from your lips.”

Haru frowns. Akira gestures around them with a lazy arm.

“It’s part of the ritual.”

So everyone in the room went through this, how bizarre. Shrugging, she tenderly lays Astarte and Milady, her axe and gun, at the witch's feet. Fake submission is something she's all too familiar with, so seems to be the case for Akira as well if the all to knowing spark in his eyes is any indication. But that could be simply her own nurtured and misplaced distrust to those that flirt with the dark. She hums a soft note to herself and dispels the thoughts- it won't do to drag on the price to pay for a witch's aid. Resolved, Haru places a hand on his shoulder and leans down to bring their faces together. They are a breath away, the witch licks his lips and his tongue grazes Haru’s mouth.

“I am Haru Okumura,” she says gently, her lips brushing against the witch’s.

The witch is smirking a smile befitting of a demon, white teeth reflecting the limited light in the room as if ready to devour. From the corner of her eyes, Haru sees his shadow isn't his at all. It smiles at her with a flamed maw. “And what do you vow to me, my good huntress Haru Okumura?”

She slides down to kneel before him in the circle, takes one of his hands in her smaller ones and brings his knuckles to her lips. The room looks like a cage, she blinks and for a second she is surrounded by blue velvet and cold stones for a coffin.

“I vow to you my iron and silver.”

Something slides under her skin where they touch- it’s a snare, it’s a snake, it’s the vow itself. It doesn’t bind itself yet, the touch more a promise than finality. She looks up at the witch to find his steely grey eyes staring her down and his grin greedy.

“Only that?“ The thumb of the hand she holds rubs circle against the back of her hand. “Good huntress, will you vow to me your thorns and roses too?“

Haru’s eyes widen, something blooms in her gut, and she doesn’t register the whispered yes until it’s past her lips and floating to the ground like petals.

More resolutely, she squeezes Akira’s hand. “Yes.“

There’s a click, there’s a vow written in the circle at their feet. Haru sees in her peripheral vision, in the small moment when she blinks, that the cage’s door was blown open and that instead of Akira’s hands, there’s a key between her fingers.

The candles flicker, that prison room disappears like smoke, and then their flames sway and die off with a crowing laughter. Haru rises to her feet as it echoes and Akira smiles at her when he notices she let her weapons lie.

Ryuji coughs in the background. Futaba is back on her laptop grinning about something and Yusuke begins to rave about the intimacy of the vow they shared and Ann looks a bit awkwardly at Makoto.

“You didn’t have to kiss him, you know…“ The familiar in the skin of a black cat says.

“Oh!“ Red creeps up Haru’s cheeks and she clears her throat.

”That was so dramatic,” Ann teases as she falls back on the couch and Makoto agrees.

”Maybe so,” Akira says as he claps his hands and winks at the huntress. “But I got a flair for the dramatic- we'll get along just fine.”


	6. Attentat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Arsene/Akira/Akechi

Akechi's mouth is gentle as it presses against his own. The leather covering his hand is kind as it slides up and down his arm while Akira holds him by the waist. Where their chest press against one another as their lungs expand and push is warm, and it feels different from the fluttering of black wings. So different.  
  
Arsène chuckles in his lungs.  
  
There's movement behind him, except there's no movement at all and it's all in his head- Akechi's hands migrate to his lower back and bring their hips closer just as Arsène claws leave shivers in their wake as they conquer the skin on their path up his spine.  
  
The issue with dealing with devils is that they are always there in thought, in spirit and in heart even when they physically are nowhere to be found.  
  
Hot on the trail marked by Arsène, the detective's left hand firmly caresses upward. The action scrunches the fabric of his shirt, and the skin to glove contact is strange. Leather is, somehow, a bit too close to the contact of a certain thief. It's rawhide and skin, a fitting touch for a creature that's cursed. The hand slides smoothly on his back as Arsene's claws extend themselves along his ribs.  
  
"Kurus-"  
  
"Akira," he bites Akechi's lips as he whispers. "At least, when we're like this."

Thunderous cackling fill his ears, and the dissonance between the sound and Akechi's tender gaze is-

"Thank you, there is an intimacy in names that I..." Akechi trails off.

"Oh, the half demon wants so much!" Arsène curls against him, he curls under the flesh of his back and right against his vertebrae. Akira wants to call the pressure obscene. The demon pushes him forward with the care of a playful predator, and Akira uses the momentum to maneuver Akechi into a new kiss.  
  
The motion is clumsy, Arsène's cackling continues, but it's the only thing he thought of doing to mask the demon's sway.  
  
He is rewarded by, ah, his name being murmured against his lips sickly sweet, head tilting to deepen the kiss, and Akechi's arms moving to wrap around his chest. How odd, the thought passes like smoke in the back of his mind. Arsène devours it, leaves him blank and a victim of mercy, pulls his head back by the hair and makes him gasp for breath.  
  
Akechi's mouth descends to his neck, gentle, mouthing something Akira can't quite catch but that Arsène does. The demon growls a threat in his head. He can feel it now, on the side of his hips and from the inside scratching out, a mark that pearls a bit with blood.

This is ridiculous.

The demon behaves himself around the huntress, so why not now? Although, that could be due to her bathing in rosemary.

Akechi works at his neck more passionately and one hand burying itself in fluffy black curls, the other one grabbing him by the hip to keep him in place, crushing red pearls. Arsène is cawing in laughter, wings flapping with his hysterics at the attempts of the half demon. The feathers brush against the witch's shoulders and he shivers.  
  
It is in the wake of his surface skin's tremble that a curse starts flowing through his veins with a vengeance, roots that follow the rivers of his blood and pulse alongside them. Their pressure bubbles under his flesh and surface imperceptibly from his pores, Akira gasps and Akechi clutches him closer and heaves him up into another kiss with a pained hiss.  
  
Akira has the detective by the tie, pulling the lifeline closer and drinking his breath. Arsène winds him up from his bones, his claws overshadow the temperature in the room and his wings shadow him from the attic room's lighting.  
  
It's too much.  
  
He pushes Akechi away, "I forgot something downstairs." He smiles apologetically at Akechi's frowning face. "It'll only be a second."

Like a shadow, he slips down the stairs noiselessly while holding his breath.  
  
Arsène doesn't stop his stimulation when Akira leaves the room, instead he doubles them up. The curse morphs into a second set of claw that hold Akira from the inside and Arsène's feathers caress his nape.  
  
"The poor half-demon just can't compare."  
  
It's somewhere. He is certain he left it in the kitchen. Arsène keeps touching, keeps lauding and taunting an opponent that waits upstairs.  
  
"But it's not his fault- I am after all the one in your head. One simply can't usurp the mind with a few light touches here and there."  
  
The one in his brain, a phantom in his lungs, caged and caging him in bones. Completely uncaring for Akechi's carving of a place behind Akira's third rib, Arsène forges on, his chains licking magma up the line of Akira's calves.  
  
His knees buckle, but Akira reaches the drawer in time and tears it open. Arsène is uncaring, a clawed finger tip rubbing circle around Akira's hardened length. Makoto and Ann gave him a necklace, a crystal of protection. It's charged, and impressively powerful for two women who only recently delved into the occult while one was infected by an accident with lycanthropy. He reaches for it, but Arsène is not kind.  
  
A whimper escapes his mouth as suddenly all his sense are filled, and there's only over stimulation and Arsène. Arsène is on him, under him, besides him, in him, clutching him, holding him, thrusting, licking, biting scratching kissing mocking taunting--  
  
It all stops, the weight of the necklace heavy on his neck.  
  
"I can't believe you wanted to stop just to pretty yourself up." Akechi kisses the shell of his ear, voice like honey, and pulls Akira's back to his chest. The witch latches onto what he says and melts against the body behind him as he tries to regain his sense of the moment. "I'm quite flattered."  
  
A faint butterfly of poison fluttering in his stomach, Arsène is distant but still there muffled and underwater, laughing. The waves that separate them carry the demon's mockery over, "You could have just begged nicely."  
  
The crystal won't last that long, Akira knows. He'll apologize to Makoto and Ann tomorrow. At that moment though, he turns his head to the side and kisses Akechi's cheek. His gaze is hard, there's an edge to his red pupils and slitted eyes. It makes Akira wonder if he noticed that his pristine human image went out the window.  
  
"Can you blame me? Look at the gorgeous man I'm with."  
  
"Then thank you very much, Akira." Akechi's laughter rumbles against his back, and slowly he guides them back upstairs as if leading a waltz.


	7. Farther than Mother's Footsteps

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haru chapter. Marking this as complete because god knows when I'll add a new chapter.

The Okumura mansion has its fair share of rooms. All are well lit and pristine, floors sparkling from the natural sun light and mirror polished.

Haru's room is no different in that regard.

It isn't really her room, if she were being honest.

In fact, down the hall, past the paintings and vases, far away from the dealings with monsters her father strikes, is a locked door.

No one is allowed in, no one is allowed out, and everyone assumes another servant is the one that takes care of it.

It's not the only room like it in the mansion anyway in that regard.

But it's the only room to have ever belonged to her mother, the only heritage left from her her Father can't touch and taint the remnants of her memory. Not unless he wanted to lose the sole protection a hunter's tools could provide.

He wore the key to it like a charm around his neck,  an empty threat against his inhuman business partners. The day Haru took it from her sleeping father, the first day she stepped into that room and followed the singing in the halls, there had been hell to pay. That had been the only time her Father yelled at her but it had been worth it. It was, is still, worth it, the press of the key's copy between her breasts reminds her of it. 

After all, it's the room where she found herself, her calling, her future and Milady.

"Sounds like a fairy tale." Akira brews coffee behind the bar.

"Her calling was quite mesmerizing, I'll admit," Haru laughs. The rosemary on her skin an afterthought far away enough Morgana doesn't mind and curls on the chair besides her as Akira's shadow stares. It has many eyes, many faces and many names, but they are all nicknamed Arsène.

"So?"

The coffee is placed gently in front of her because for all the danger that lies under the soft demeanor of the witch, his fingers are just fingers.

"She beckoned me." The _Much like you beckoned Arsène_ goes unsaid.

Her Mother's diary had described Milady's demon form in detail. What makes her resonate, how under her regality and skirts laid arsenal upon arsenal and under her feet bones upon corpses.

"Hm, I'll add a drop or two of your dad's blood to your coffee next time," Akira quips with grinning gun metal eyes and that's all that Haru needs to know that he is more than aware of the implications on her nature.

She doesn't bother reminding him that demons can change, and what is left of Milady, what was tailored into multiple firearms of diffetent caliber for her Mother's hunt, is different from the madonna she used to be.

She doesn't, because she knows it'll paint her in a less favourable light and she finds she likes being under the welcoming spotlight of the witch's eyes.

Either way, Akira doesn't need her explanations and he stretches like a cat. His shadow follows the movement as its eyes blink slowly.

"I found out how to hunt from my Mother's journal." It was really just a journal, describing her days, her meals, her wounds and strikes. The witch didn't need to know how truly mundane it was. "There's an entry on witches too, multiple in fact."

But they were all mainly about tea parties and pastry recipes.

Raising his hands in the air, the witch signals defeat. His shadow doesn't look at her anymore, and becomes nothing more than it was ever supposed to be.

Haru sips her coffee and is flattered by the trust.

The silence doesn't last long. It's ended as Haru finds most things end around the barista- with Akira gesturing with a nod or with a flick of his eyes. He stares questioningly at the axe by her side. Its blade glints under the light sleepily as it awaits its moment of radiance under the moon's guidance.

"She was my first successful hunt. I killed her by shooting her head off with Milady."

Astarte was a demon mentioned in the last few entries of her Mother's diary. She had been looking for her, wanted to mark the end of her maternity leave and the birth of her son with her death, but -

Haru downcasts her eyes. Things rarely go as they are planned. She wonders if she could consider herself lucky that her Mother's demonic arms had been stashed home and had been weakened enough by the years and imprisonment to bend and bloom at Haru's will.

"Hunters and witches are more similar than I first thought." 

"I guess," Haru hums softly into the porcelain rim of her cup, "the only difference is that you postrate yourself to demons whereas I make them kneel for me."

The witch barks a laugh that startles his familiar awake almost as much as it surprised the witch himself. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot how to write goddang.  
> Anyway unbetad and written as i starve at work cause you gotta do something sometimes. 
> 
> As always feel free to point out mistakes ayyyye i need sleep for like 235665434567 hours


	8. In a Name

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [AkeShu]
> 
> If that's what you want, I'll call you that.

"Where are my manners- my name is Akechi Goro."

The TV station employees buzz around them while the slowly dispersing audience stares at the celebrity. The murmuring of their gossiping is loud under Arsène, their stares heavy and Akira wants to leave. Not because of the way their eyes don't do anything to hide their jealousy, not because of the way their hands fail to strangle their words -

"Such a bold faced liar," Arsène purrs into his ear. Akechi is still waiting, his hand extended in a sign of peaceful acquaintance. Akira notes quietly and without hesitation that the detectives eyes give him away. How bizarre. There's a hum of a demon's agreement in his bones, and Arsène does him the favour of extending his arm for him. He gets control back just as their hands touch.

"You look different up close."

A pleasant chuckle. " I do hope that you mean it in a good way." Akira shrugs and Arsène drapes himself under his skin.

"The half demon would be good enough to fool you had we not been wearing each other."

Akechi squeezes his hand as if to rip and turn Akira's full attention to himself- it's not that he hadn't been listening, just not looking himself. The darkness at the witch's feet had its sights on the celebrity for him, but there's probably only so much Akechi can see.

"You're rather quiet, but you sure know how to make an impression," Akira wants to pull away. Or maybe it's Arsène who wants to and is swaying him. "I hope you don't mind if we talk again next time we meet."

"I didn't think that the way into your schedule was to defend the possibility of dark arts."

Akechi laughs, it sounds like Arsène mask feels under his finger tips. Akira wonders when all his senses started getting muddled up together.

"I just find opposing ideas fascinating." Akira snorts, and the half demon in front of him smiles with a glint in his eyes.

He leaves not much longer after Arsène wraps him in his wings and shields him from the more scathing looks of the crowd. The detective conjures an excuse as if he hadn't wanted to talk anyway, stares at a spot a bit too high on his head to have actually been looking at the witch. And it was a somewhat blank stare- eyes unfocused and eyebrows furrowed.

The demon nuzzles its mask into his hair, and Akira tries to indulge in his bad habit of putting one and one together. He can't though, not with the way the demon sinks its jaws into his thoughts and steals them away.

What a strange school trip.

 

* * *

 

Goro's hands trail up Akira's arms. He can feel slight shivers following the roads he traces, the disturbance in the thin body hair. The rising sun's light that falls through the window is warm on his skin, the witch warmer and soft under his fingertips. He traces the muscles over the skin, follows the tendons and imagines where the sinews lie and how the bones fit together.

It's in the little things, the little moments of peace where that void, _that thing,_ didn't dance under the surface of the boy's skin.

One of the rare moments where Akira Kurusu was just a young man, and Goro was... He was-

He was what he has always been.

In the dusty attic, he takes his time to build Akira up, piece by piece, in his head. He doesn't make an image, he can't, so he makes himself a sculpture. A physical memory for the pads of his fingers to trace in the air when he feels like remembering. He feels like remembering often nowadays. He knows it'll destroy him in the end, but he has always been someone at the mercy of the past.

A new memory to wound himself with means nothing at this point. The light dust in the air doesn't even irritate his nose now.

But maybe it won't, that shadow was nowhere to be felt. He wonders if it's due to the sun, he wonders how he could pocket its light and shine it on Akira every day.

Goro knows that he alone can't chase shadows away. He tried. Akira Kurusu's name had no power over the witch and it's a shame.

It's envious really.

He finds Akira's mouth at the end of his touch's pilgrimage. it took long with the detours in soft hair that gently curled about the phalanges of his fingers as if asking in soft, sweet whispers to stay and to not stray. But if there is one thing Goro is good at, it's following his own will through.

He wants to sculpt, trace Akira in the air as he waits, feel him under his palms even when he is long gone.

Goro leans closer, breathes against Akira's cheeks and feels him breathe in. With the proximity, Akira could have only inhaled Goro's breath in, and that's good. That's fine. That's nice- he wants the memory to be sculpted in utmost perfection. And that brings him to lean even closer. And closer. And-

"My name is-"

Against sleeping lips, Goro pours, but he knows he doesn't reach anything. He can't, not when the half demon is afraid of how it could shackle him.  
  


* * *

 

Walking out of the television station, Akira asks Arsène why Akechi would lie about his name.

"Is it because there's power in a name?"

The sky is clear, and the weather is gentle. Birds fly above him and feathers brush against him. They are the colour of his hair and get lost in it.

"They only ever hold as much power as one gives them."

The witch hums an acknowledgement. He can see Ryuji and Ann waiting for him on the other side of the street and packs the new little bit of information for later analysis. The thief lets him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feel free to point out typos, god knows I dont proofread jackshit. I figured it was time for me to write softer AkeShu.


End file.
